Analysis: ARM Chips Could Appear in Apple Netbooks, Tablets

Apple’s recent acquisition of a semiconductor company suggests the corporation is developing mobile chips that will power not just iPhones, but netbooks and tablets as well.

CEO Steve Jobs acknowledged in April that Apple acquired PA Semi to work on chips for iPhones and iPods. And it’s reasonable to infer that Apple will use these CPUs in its entrance into the netbook and tablet categories (or whatever Jobs decides to call them).

Why? The successful iPhone is currently powered by an ARM chip, and these processors can now do anything an Intel chip can do (except run Windows), explains ComputerWorld’s Seth Weintraub. Also, ARM chips are extremely inexpensive, with costs as low as $10 a piece. And finally, ARM is 10 to 20 times more power-efficient than Intel’s low-powered Atom processor found in almost every netbook today.

In an October conference call, Jobs said Apple wasn’t ready to offer a netbook, as the mini notebooks remain a "nascent category." However, he added that Apple has some "pretty interesting ideas" if the category matures.

But piling evidence gives away that Apple has far more than just "ideas." In addition to the acquisition of PA Semi, Apple recently hired former IBM executive Mark Papermaster, famous for developing the Power PC chips used in previous generation Macs. And with $25 billion in the bank, Apple has a good amount of leeway to introduce in-house computer chips to its ecosystem.

Here’s The Thing With Ad Blockers

We get it: Ads aren’t what you’re here for. But ads help us keep the lights on. So, add us to your ad blocker’s whitelist or pay $1 per week for an ad-free version of WIRED. Either way, you are supporting our journalism. We’d really appreciate it.